“The Axe! The Axe of Gonnas!” ogres cried, their voices shrill with dismay. Bruni jumped down and waded forward, laying waste to right and left, and all around the attackers gaped and groaned at the sight of the artifact. The Axe of Gonnas was their hallowed icon, treasured by generations of Suderhold’s kings and high priests. Now the appearance of the sacred blade, at the same time as their king lay bleeding and as this human and elf fought them with such tireless intensity, proved cruelly disheartening.

Some of the ogres edged back away from the yawning gate, then turned to flee the citadel, ignoring the impassioned cries of their captains-who waited with fresh warriors just beyond arrow range of the walls. A small knot of attackers remained, protecting their fallen ruler, but now they were squeezed from three sides. The elf paused, blinking the haze of sweat and smoke from his eyes as Strongwind came up beside him. The Highlander king joined Kerrick, Randall, and Bruni, as the ogres retreated, some carrying the wounded monarch, others turning to give their lives so Grimwar Bane could be brought to safety.

“There!” warned Strongwind, clapping Kerrick on the shoulder and pointing toward the edge of the clearing. Through a gap he saw the ogre catapult, cocked and poised.

“Let’s get it,” agreed the elf, suddenly focused on the big weapon.

Bruni and Randall nodded, and the four made a dash through the scattered ogres toward the wheeled machine.

A strangely garbed, impressive-looking ogress stood next to the catapult. Kerrick recognized the queen he had met in battle eight years earlier, wresting the Axe of Gonnas from her hands. Now this ogre queen screeched a command, but the nearby warriors ignored her, flocking to surround their stricken monarch. She looked in panic at the machine but couldn’t trigger it herself, and at the last moment she turned and fled with the panicked troops of her army, lumbering down the slope, leaving the catapult undefended.

“Help me turn it!” cried Bruni, putting her shoulder to one of the great wheels as Strongwind and Randall knocked the chocks away. Kerrick, still filled with magical strength, sheathed his sword so he could help. His sinews strained, and the elf grunted, pushing and pushing, gradually wheeling the catapult around toward the fleeing ogres. He saw something gold and round in the load basket but had barely registered the sight when Strongwind Whalebone chopped downward, slashing the trigger. With a loud snap, the catapult’s arm whipped upward, hurling the sphere into the air, far, far toward the seashore below the fortress.

Immediately Kerrick turned to the ogres, drawing his sword, sprinting with murderous intensity toward the stricken king.

“Chislev Wilder, see defeat! Hold the hasty warrior’s feet!”

The magic chant came from behind him, but Kerrick didn’t even hear the words. Instead, he flailed furiously as his boots became stuck fast to the ground. He cried out in grief and rage as the shaman’s magic robbed him of his chance to pursue the retreating enemy with a final killing frenzy that would have borne him into the enemy ranks.

Kerrick sobbed in frustration as he felt Bruni’s strong arms encircle him, somehow plucking the sword from his clutching fingers. He sagged, fatigue suddenly sapping him, and when she slipped the ring off of his finger he collapsed into her embrace.

The sky turned a brilliant searing white, and the ground heaved and writhed under his feet. A blast of sound chopped through the air, deafening all who heard it, and the elf felt as though an angry god had picked him up, them slammed him to the ground with immortal fury.

Finally he lay in a place of utter, consuming darkness.

14

King’s Rout

A curtain of red, pulsing and fiery, filled the view of Grimwar Bane. He could hardly breathe, and it was impossible to move. He strained to clench a fist, even to wiggle his toes within the heavy, whaleskin boot. The king was vaguely aware of being borne on a makeshift litter, hauled down the hill and onto the terraced fields, away from Brackenrock. He tried to object, to order these craven cowards to turn back, to pour through the breach, swarm across those walls, and raze the entire cursed citadel.

Someone cried out something about the catapult, and he wanted to repeat his orders even louder-shoot the orb! Blast Brackenrock into dust! Damn the Axe of Gonnas and every other trivial complication-blow that wretched place off the face of Krynn!

No words came. Instead, there was crushing pain in his chest, and each bubbling breath required a monstrous effort. Wetness spilled down his flanks, sticky within the confines of his leather shirt and punctured breastplate, and he realized that he was leaking blood. Cold fear rose within him-for the first time in his life he confronted the possibility that he was mortal, that he might die. The very notion seemed monstrously unfair, incomprehensible.

“I refuse!” He wanted to bellow the denial but instead merely coughed an inarticulate word, tasting blood in his throat. No! He couldn’t imagine that his life had come to this, to a dirty retreat from a band of ragged human rabble.

That red sheet blocking his vision thinned slightly, cleared enough that he could see the sky above and the ocean below. Frantically he struggled to rise, to strike these disobedient ogres who carried him away from the fight, but he fell back in agony, watching as his quarry, that nightmare citadel, receded in his hazy vision. He smelled salty air, saw his beautiful ships so far below, drawn onto the beach where they had landed. Not there… not yet…

Something sparkled in his line of sight, a golden flicker of brightness, and again he remembered the orb.

* * * * *

Stariz stumbled down the slope toward the second terrace, falling onto her face in the trampled mud of a ruined field. The ogre queen lay still, hoping she was unseen, fearing the thrust of human steel into her back, but there were no footsteps, no obvious signs of pursuit.

She was still lying there when she heard the spring-snap noise of the catapult triggering its heavy load. Numb with disbelief, she understood only that the golden orb was not supposed to be launched until she had the Axe of Gonnas in her hands. Bitter fury blinded her, but she choked back the screams of rage. Instead she hissed to herself, “The humans will suffer for this-they and whoever has aided them will die in pain and misery and subjugation!”

She pushed herself up to her knees, and only then did she recognize the orb arcing over her head, soaring outward and downward, toward the shore. In a moment it had plummeted from her field of vision, falling beyond the rim of the terrace. With a gasp, she rose to her feet and started forward at a lumbering run. Before she reached the edge of the flat, muddy grange, everything turned white, as if she had crashed into the sun. She felt the ground heave under her feet, and the brilliance became a hole in the center of her vision. She staggered on, reaching the lip of the terrace, staring dizzily down the steep hill at the beach. The sea had erupted into a mountainous fountaining wave.

No, it was a series of waves rippling toward the beach. Wood and sticks blew past in the furious wind, and she vaguely understood that one of the galleys had been shattered. Bodies flew by and rolled around on the shore, and she was vaguely aware these were ogre bodies-though they looked insignificant, almost toylike, from her vantage.

The blast of waves took longer to strike the other galley, Goldwing, and in bright, flickering flashes the ogre queen now saw the royal ship heel violently, spin sideways and skid through the shallows parallel to the shoreline-blown as though it was a leaf. She was still watching, mesmerized, when an invisible force hit her in the face. The huge ogress was thrown backward as though she had been slapped by a dragon’s tail. Flattened on her back, gasping for air, she offered a mute prayer to her mighty god, a plea for survival and vengeance.